


Meet Me in the Woods

by thaliagrayce



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mortal, Alternate Universe - Summer Camp, Jason Grace is a Good Friend, Lesbian Thalia Grace, M/M, hand waving at canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-25
Updated: 2020-06-25
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:07:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24908101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thaliagrayce/pseuds/thaliagrayce
Summary: Jason Grace has been going to Mount Olympus Summer Camp every year since he was seven years old. For him, it's always been a place of friendship and freedom, somewhere he can step out from underneath his parents' expectations and be himself for two months straight. He spends the entire year waiting to go back and spend time with his sister and his friends in the light of the summer sun.Enter Nico di Angelo, lonely-looking emo kid who has a vastly different mental image of camp. Something about him intrigues Jason, and he's determined to help Nico learn that no matter what his history may be, there is a place for him at Mount Olympus.Little does Jason know that he's got a lot to learn, too.
Relationships: Jason Grace & Thalia Grace, Nico di Angelo/Jason Grace
Comments: 8
Kudos: 33





	Meet Me in the Woods

**Author's Note:**

> here we go!!! this is the first multichapter fic i've attempted since high school, so i'm just as curious as to how this will go as you are. there are plans! but there's also a lot of blank space in those plans. i'm gonna try to update every two weeks, but like. who can really tell with my adhd ass.
> 
> all the chapter titles are from songs on my jasico playlist, because i hate naming things and this makes it so much easier. this one is from broken by lovelytheband

_ Sunday, June 21, 11 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Arrival. _

Jason hiked his huge backpack up and adjusted the strap, hoping it was uncomfortable because it was twisted, not because it was falling apart on the very first day of camp. He didn’t have the best track record when it came to luck, but that would be pushing it, even for him. Once it felt more secure, he heaved his duffel bag out of the trunk, shifting its weight enough so that he could close the hatch after it. He probably packed too much again, but that was fine. He could deal.

“Jason, have you been in contact with your sister? Is she here yet?”

At his stepmother’s voice, Jason tensed up. He had been in contact with Thalia, he had texted her a picture of the welcome sign to camp, and June knew this as well as he did. June also knew that there was no way in hell that Thalia would willingly come see her. He took a deep breath, taking in the combination of pine, car exhaust, and good ol’ midwestern humidity.

“Yeah, she’s in training right now. Some important workshop on leadership, you know how it goes. Councilors are busy.” She was, in fact, waiting somewhere just out of eyesight in the woods, and would probably ambush him as soon as June drove away, but Jason liked to maintain at least a veneer of civility. Nobody else in this family was going to.

His stepmother tutted in reply, purposefully loud enough for Jason to hear. “And she couldn’t get out for five minutes to say hello?”

Jason closed his eyes for a moment, fixing a smile on his face, then walked around the car to lean on the driver’s side window. June had the windows cracked exactly one inch, and his skin that was closest to the window broke out in goosebumps from the AC on full blast.

“I’m sure she would if she could. I’ll tell her you said hi.”

His stepmother smiled at him, candy-apple-red lipstick pulled tight. “Do. I miss having her around, and I worry about her all the way out here.” This was excruciating. He needed to end the conversation as soon as possible so that he could get on with his summer.

“That’s sweet of you, but I’m sure she’s fine. Thank you for seeing me off, you didn’t have to.” Ten yards away, someone was giving their 12-year-old what looked like an entire summer’s worth of hugs all condensed into one rib-crushing experience.

“Of course, darling!” Through the glass, her smile widened. Her hands were still on the steering wheel. “I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Jason stepped away from the car. “I appreciate it. Have a save drive back home.”

“Have a nice summer. I love you!” She waved at him one last time before rolling up the window, then set to focusing on getting out of the parking lot without hitting any stray children.

Jason watched her pull out, then turned to the woods, already feeling a little lighter. He hiked his backpack up again and started walking.

* * *

The Grace siblings had been going to Mount Olympus Summer Camp for as long as Jason cared to remember. It was a two-hour-long car trip from their hometown to a bunch of cabins with no air conditioning in the middle of the woods in nowhere, USA. The mosquitoes were always hungry and vicious, someone fainted from dehydration at least once every year, and the two of them had gotten enough sunburn there to last several lifetimes.

It was Jason’s favorite place. All of his happiest childhood memories came from these woods and the people in them, from singing around the campfire and games of capture the flag and hours spent learning the perfect friendship bracelet techniques. These cabins felt more like home than his real home did, and he knew that Thalia felt the same—she moved out of the house as soon as she could, but kept volunteering to come back to camp even after she aged out of the program. It was an escape from the stifling expectations of the Grace household for both of them.

Jason switched his duffel bag from his right hand to his left, flexing his fingers after he let go. He really needed to learn how to pack lighter, but he was always worried that he might absolutely _need_ the one thing that he left— 

The slap was hard enough to be numb at first; Jason heard the _smack_ before he felt the sting of the palm against his bicep. It took less than a second for his skin to catch up with his ears, though, and— “Son of a… _ow_!” —that was gonna leave a mark.

“Mosquito. You’re welcome.” Thalia grinned at him as she fell into step beside him on the woodchip-paved path, taking his duffel from him and hiking it over her shoulder. Her freckles were already out in full force, taking over her face entirely and creeping out over every other free inch of skin, from her knees smudged with mud to the shoulders that she had exposed by rolling up the sleeves of her councilor t-shirt. There was also a stripe of red, flushed skin across the bridge of her nose and both of her ears. She might not have been at camp for very long, but it seemed as though she was already working on her beginning-of-the-summer sunburn.

Jason rubbed at his arm where she smacked him and tried to put as much venom into his glare as he could manage, though he doubted it had any effect on his sister. “You should be nicer to me. June wanted me to go get you so she could say hi, but I told her you had important councilor duties.”

“Thank you, you saved my life.” For once, she didn’t sound sarcastic. Even with the pain, it was nice to see her again. Trying to stay mad was futile, so Jason gave up. He smiled.

“I guess you owe me now. You have to help me with the fitted sheet.”

Thalia groaned as they passed a couple younger campers who were walking too slowly. Jason tried not to laugh—they couldn’t have been older than 12 or 13, but they were still the same height as Thalia at 20 years old.

“You better not take the top bunk again this year.”

He was definitely taking the top bunk again this year.

* * *

Three of the twelve available bunks were already made up when Jason got to the Zeus cabin—unusual, he was always one of the first people to get to camp. The bottom bunk closest to the door on the left was obviously Grover’s, like it had been last year. Jason would have been able to tell even without the wooden “COUNCILOR” sign hanging on the bedpost—he had the same worn out canvas backpack propped against the headboard, and the goat stuffed animal that all the boys in the cabin had an unspoken agreement not to tease him about. Across from Grover’s bed, on the bottom bunk directly to the right of the door, it looked like Frank had already neatly organized and claimed his space and pinned up a couple pictures of his family and non-camp friends on the headboard.

The bottom bunk in the back left corner had already been taken, as well. Last year, that bed had been Beckendorf’s bunk, but he was too old to be a camper this summer—it couldn’t have been him. Jason took a quick glance at the bunk and its surroundings: well-worn dark grey sheets that might have been black at one point in time, black backpack with a few sewn on patches slumped at the foot of the bed, two sparse-looking pillows with little polka dots on the pillowcases. At least that’s what they looked like from this distance and with smudgy glasses—Jason would have to clean them, but not before the inevitable headlock he would get from Percy, and possible hugs from the rest. He could see the corner of a dark duffel bag sticking out from under the untucked edge of the sheet, and there was a leather-bound journal and mechanical pencil sitting on the bed. Jason had lived with most of the boys in this cabin for two months last summer; either this setup belonged to one of the new kids, or someone was going through a serious emo phase.

More importantly, whoever it was hadn’t taken his usual spot. Left wall, middle bed, top bunk. The position in the cabin meant that his bed got optimal airflow during even the most stagnant of August days. It was close enough to the windows that, should he find himself unable to sleep for the fourth time in a week, he could just look at the stars instead. The top bunk meant that people (Leo) were less likely to mess with his stuff or put shaving cream in his pillowcase. Left side of the cabin faced away from all the other cabins, so he could turn on his side and look at the woods instead of a couple of 12-year-olds trying to figure out the most effective way to cover each other in dirt. Best spot. His spot. He grinned and headed straight toward it, ignoring the way that Thalia grumbled as she followed him in.

“Anyone make it to Juno yet?” Jason set his backpack down on the bunk beneath his and took his duffel from Thalia, getting to work on finding his sheets.

Thalia was the councilor for the girls’ 14+ cabin, the Juno cabin. That was the way Olympus worked, its whole gimmick—each age group had a cabin that was named after one of the Ancient Greek or Roman gods, and typically they stuck with the same cabin every year. When Jason had first arrived, every boy his age was either in the Hephaestus or the Vulcan cabin. There was a bit of a rivalry between the two halves of the camp, even though it was completely arbitrary which side a kid went to when they first arrived. As they got older, they stayed in the same cabin every year—better for bonding with your cabinmates like that, and it created a kind of identity. Jason was a Vulcan kid from age 7 to age 13. After that, though, there just weren’t enough returning campers to have all the ages split up, let alone into two cabins, so all the boys from ages 14 to 18 were merged into the same cabin—the Zeus cabin. Same thing happened for girls, but the camp directors wanted to make sure that both the Roman side and the Greek side had a cabin of “big kids” to look up to, so Juno it was. Jason had some good friends in that cabin—the older kids all tended to stick together when they could.

Thalia walked over and flopped onto one of the unused bunks while Jason shuffled around in his bag. “New girl came in, her name’s Hazel. I think she was in Proserpine last year, seems like a sweet kid. She was still setting up when I left, so I should get back pretty soon. Her brother’s helping her out, but I still shouldn’t leave any campers alone. Red’s here, too, but she just dumped her bags on her bed and ran to crafts. Hugged me first, though.” She was smiling as she said this, that didn’t escape Jason’s notice. Thalia cared about her campers a lot more than she let on. After spending as much time together as they did each summer, it was hard not to form close friendships.

Jason finally tugged the corner of his well-worn blue sheets out of his bag. “You can go back after you help. You do the window side.”

After their fifth attempt at getting the final corner of the sheet on, the door to the Zeus cabin burst open with so much force that the frame banged against the wall. Jason smiled without even looking up.

“Aw sick, do I get help, too? I got a few ideas about cabin decoration if y’all wanna be the muscle behind my genius.”

The corner finally went down and Jason turned to Leo Valdez, his best friend and the most annoying person he knew. Leo hipchecked him, trying to get Jason to budge out of the way as he shoved all of his baggage onto the bunk below. Once he was unburdened, Jason held his arms out for a hug. Leo didn’t hesitate.

He did do a double take, though, once he pulled back enough to actually see Jason’s face properly.

“Oh _man_ , for real? The squinting wasn’t because you were trying to look all broody?” He reached out and pushed Jason’s glasses, which he hadn’t told anyone at camp about, further up his nose. “Forget Captain America, I’m gonna have to start calling you Clark Kent now, you look like such a dweeb.”

Thalia snorted from behind him, which drew Leo’s attention. “Oh, T, almost didn’t see you down there. How’s it?”

She said nothing in response, just raised one eyebrow at him. Jason tried very hard not to smile at the way he fidgeted.

“Just as scary without all the eyeliner, nice to see you’ve been working on the glare. Don’t you, like, have campers or something? Pipes and I came together, so—and there she goes.”

As soon as he mentioned Piper’s name, Thalia had turned to go to her own cabin and welcome her friend back. “See ya, J-man,” she called over her shoulder. “I’ll tell Grover to get back to work if I see him.”

The door shut with a thud before Jason started laughing at the leftover Awkward hovering around Leo.

“Dude, how the _fuck_ are you related to her? You’re like a giant buff cupcake, she looks like a dagger came to life and got freckles. Are you sure you’re not adopted?”

Jason didn’t bother answering him, just took his bags off Leo’s bunk and started unpacking his stuff into his chest at the foot of their bed. Leo expected that, though, and continued talking to Jason as he got his own bunk set up. He told stories about the car ride to camp with him, his foster dad, and Piper all crammed into his foster dad’s tiny car, or things that happened at school that he forgot to tell Jason over Skype, or things Jason was pretty sure actually never happened but were fun stories anyway.

Unpacking continued on like that, pretty peacefully. It was nice to be around Leo for real again, not just connected through Skype or Discord or whatever system Leo decided was the best this time. Jason could reach out his foot and trip Leo up every time he said something dumb, hip check him every time he made a bad pun. Or just to show off that he could, that he was close enough to touch his best friend again after months of being apart.

Grover came back to the cabin near the end of unpacking and gave them both hugs, as expected. He had a new walking cane this year, all made of wood and naturey-looking, and he swapped that for Jason’s glasses so they could both get a good look at the new additions to the cabin. Frank wasn’t far behind, and he gave Jason and Leo a wave before Jason pulled him bodily into a hug. Leo punched him on the shoulder, but that was pretty normal. Grover told them that they still had about an hour until arrival and move-in period was officially over, so they were free to do whatever (go find Piper) as long as they were back by 4:30.

* * *

They beat Percy back to the Zeus cabin by about thirty seconds. He was usually the last one to arrive, and always had at least three fresh lipstick marks on his cheeks and forehead from his mom. This year, it looked like his mom had gone for an obnoxious orange for the occasion. Knowing Sally Jackson, she probably bought the color specifically for today. Grover waited for Percy by the door and grabbed his face as soon as he walked in, leaving noisy kisses on his cheeks.

“Percy! I missed you so much! Have you been eating well? Taking care of yourself?”

Jason knew for a fact that the two of them had been hanging out just last weekend, Grover had sent last year’s cabin group chat a picture of Percy stuck in a baby swing.

Percy shoved at Grover’s head to get him away, but he was still smiling. “Aw man, not in front of the newbies!”

And suddenly, Jason became aware of the rest of the room. Yeah, he knew Percy already, and Grover and Frank and Leo, but there were two kids in various stages of Awkward Newcomer standing just outside of their little ring of friends. While Leo and Frank got to greeting Percy, Jason studied the new kids.

He sort of recognized both of them, just from seeing them around camp for a few years, but he couldn’t confidently put a name to either face. One of them looked nervous in an excited kind of way, like a puppy that wasn’t sure if this car ride was going to end at the dog park or the vet. Summer had barely begun, but the kid already had a tan started. When he smiled, he showed off both dimples and a mouth full of braces, which was pretty endearing, honestly. Jason could practically _feel_ the optimism radiating off of this kid.

The other one looked nervous in an I’m-going-to-be-sick way, which was a little concerning. He could tell from the first glance that this was the one who had taken the corner bunk when he first got in, the mystery emo phase boy. It was June, but he was wearing jeans and a hoodie, all black. He was pale and skinny and conspicuously looking away from the scene at the doorway, where Percy and Leo were trying to put each other into a headlock at the same time. For a brief moment, the kid’s eyes flickered up to meet Jason’s.

Now, usually you don’t notice the color of people’s eyes right away—that was reserved for sappy romance novels and badly-written fanfiction—but this kid had the deepest brown eyes Jason had ever seen in his life. It helped that they were huge, like some Disney character come to life. It almost seemed like his eyes were black, like if you looked hard enough you might actually see stars or something in them.

The kid looked down again. Jason mentally shook himself. Could one person be emo enough to turn their eyes black? Weird. He blamed the kid and the strangely charged moment they shared for distracting him enough to let Percy sneak up on him, almost knocking him over with the force of his hug from behind.

“Bro you got glasses? Lemme see!”

Percy almost poked Jason in the eye trying to get the glasses off of his face, put his fingers directly on the lenses, and kept Jason in a loose headlock the whole time he tried the glasses on and announced that Jason was blind. It was uncomfortable, at least three people were laughing at him, and he would have to spend two full minutes trying to get the smudges off the glass.

He smiled. He was home.

* * *

_4:30 p.m.-6 p.m. Introductions, policies, and dinner. _

“Okay, we’re not allowed to play Ninja anymore.” Grover took a moment to look from Leo’s smug grin to Frank, who had the decency to look sheepish. “So I uh…” He dug into his pocket and took out a folded-up piece of notebook paper, complete with fringe on the sides from where he ripped it out of the spiral. “I had to find some different ice breakers for us this year. That involve more talking to each other and less, uh, potential injury.”

Jason heard a _smack_ from across the circle, but he wasn’t really sure who it came from. The newly-formed Zeus Cabin for the year were all in the grassy patch behind their cabin for the yearly get-to-know-you sessions, which were a lot more important and fun when they were little and more likely to forget their cabinmates between summers, or when they actually got more than two new cabinmates per year. The icebreakers that the camp directors picked out for everyone were usually super corny and kind of embarrassing, but any amount of cheesy summer camp activity was worth enduring for the look of pain on Percy’s face when he had to come up with a fun fact about himself that nobody in the circle already knew. Jason was sitting between Leo and one of the new kids, the one with braces and a little bit too much excitement. There hadn’t been any introductions yet, but that was sort of the point of ice breakers.

“So, instead of starting the year off with a trip to the nurse, we’re going to start with two truths and a lie. Does anyone not know that one?”

“Oh, I’m great at this.” Leo cracked his knuckles in front of him. “One: I set my microwave on fire last week. Two: I’ve been permabanned from the aux cord during all road trips. Three: I’ve got a signed life-sized cutout of Tristan McLean in my closet. Jason isn’t allowed to answer.”

Grover cleared his throat. “You have to introduce yourself first. Please.”

“Oh shit, right, new people.”

“Can’t you pretend to use camp appropriate language for, like, one week?”

Leo ignored him. “I’m Leo Valdez, handsomest and most popular devil you’ll ever meet. Which one is the lie.”

The new kid with braces was just staring at him with his eyes halfway between widened and narrow, probably trying to decide if any of the statements were true. The other one hadn’t said anything yet, as far as Jason could tell. Both of his hands were shoved into the pockets of his hoodie and he was looking resolutely down, cutting off eye contact with anyone in the group.

“It’s the second one.” Frank sounded confident in his answer. “Your music taste is better than the rest of your personality.”

Percy barked out a laugh loud enough to make Jason jump and shoved his hands in front of his face, trying to keep it quiet as he fell to pieces. Leo made a big performance of acting offended, but he couldn’t keep the smile off his face for long enough to be convincing at all.

“Frank Zhang! Was that— That was rude! You just burned me! What happened to you!”

From behind his fist, Percy snickered “not as bad as you burned your microwave, dude.”

Frank, for his part, was doing an admirable job of neither laughing nor looking too guilty for the insult.

“I know better now. I came prepared this summer.”

Last year had been Jason and Leo’s first summer in the Zeus Cabin, while Frank was in his second summer there. At first, he and Leo hadn’t gotten along. At all. The two of them had spent a lot of time butting heads and antagonizing each other before the older campers stepped in. They got along just fine by the end of the summer, but it took work on both of their parts. Honestly, it was kind of a relief to hear Frank insult Leo so early on. They would be just fine this year.

“Was he right?” Grover was in councilor mode, which was a little weird to see. Jason wondered how long the overt responsibility would last.

“Yeah, my playlists are even hotter than me.” Leo grinned as three separate people in the group rolled their eyes.

“Alright, Frank, you guessed it right, so it’s your turn next.”

Frank’s options were playing piano, being Canadian, and being a wrestler. Percy was the one who pointed out that the wrestler thing was fake—which seemed a little unfair, considering he had known Frank the longest out of all of them—and switched to his turn. He went a cheap route; his statements were “blue is not my favorite color,” “ green is not my favorite color,” and “orange is not my favorite color”. Jason booed him and Leo threw a pencil at him, and braces new kid—Will Solace—was the first one to get it right, mainly because he wasn’t teasing Percy for taking a cheap shot like that. Will wanted to be a doctor and had the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet memorized, but he couldn’t play the banjo. Grover lied about being allergic to goats, but Jason only knew that because his other statements were pretty obvious if you knew the guy. He was vegetarian and used a cane sometimes.

Jason had enough time to think of three good ones, and he was pretty sure he could throw at least one person off.

“Okay, my name is Jason Grace and A, I’m on the football team, B, I study Latin for fun, and C, My favorite movie is Sky High.” He gave a sharp look to Leo, who mimed zipping his mouth shut.

“It’s the football one.” The other new kid, Emo Boy, was the one to answer this time. Correctly, too. Jason watched as he twisted a ring that Jason hadn’t noticed he’d been wearing.

“You’re right. How could you tell?”

The new kid finally looked up, and Jason was taken aback again at just how dark the boy’s eyes were. He would have had to get very, very close in order to differentiate pupil from iris.

“It’s obvious, isn’t it?” He looked Jason over, and Jason felt more exposed than he was comfortable with. “The other two options are meant to play off of the way you look and throw us off. They were both unexpected, but football wasn’t.”

That was… a bit too insightful for someone who he’d never really spoken to before. He’d gotten Jason completely right. Jason tried not to seem too interested or pleased. Who _was_ this kid?

“Insightful. Your turn, then.”

He took some time to think, eyes staring at the grass in front of him without any focus at all. He blinked after a few seconds.

“My name is Nico di Angelo. I’m bilingual, I know how to use a sword, and I have a twin.”

Jason blinked. All of those options seemed pretty unlikely, honestly. Probably the bilingual option was correct—that was maybe the least likely to be something someone would lie about—but the other two. On one hand, who actually knew how to use a sword? Maybe he fenced, that was a thing, but it still wasn’t exactly common. On the other hand, who lied about having a twin?

Percy spoke up before he could think too much, though. “You don’t have a twin, but you do have a sister.”

Nico looked up again, and his expression was undoubtedly a glare. This was the second—third?—time that Jason had seen him actually look at someone else, and there was nothing short of _venom_ in those eyes. It sent a shiver down his spine.

“I thought you were only supposed to answer if you didn’t already know.”

Percy shrugged, seeming impervious to the ice in Nico’s eyes. Either he was completely oblivious, or he was a better actor than Jason gave him credit for. There was something going on there, both of them were… on edge, he guessed, around each other. There was some sort of history between them, and it didn’t look like the very friendly variety, if the expression on Nico’s face said anything.

All Jason could hope was that they could grow past whatever it was, like Leo and Frank had. Otherwise, this was going to be a tense two months.

* * *

_6 p.m.-8 p.m. Annual Welcome-To-Camp capture the flag match._

The annual Welcome Back Barbecue was fantastic, but it wasn’t the focus of the night. Jason broke out in a smile as soon as he saw Grover take out familiar-looking orange bandannas once they finished eating. All the councilors on the west half of the dining pavilion were doing the same, like a meadow of gaudy orange flowers spontaneously popping up.

“I still think the Romans get an advantage,” Percy said as he folded the bandanna Grover passed him and tied it around his forehead. “They get purple and we get neon orange. How is that fair?”

“Maybe it’s supposed to be a challenge?” Jason tried to tie his around his bicep with one hand, but it wasn’t working very well.

“Trust me, it’s not an advantage.” Frank took pity on Jason and helped him out. “That purple always gave me a headache when I looked at it for too long.”

Sure enough, the east half of the dining pavilion was slowly being overcome with the most dizzying shade of purple Jason had ever seen. Jason saw the two camp directors disappear into the woods with the worn out and well-loved camp flags as the councilors herded all the campers to a huddle on their respective sides.

“Alright, Greeks!” The smile on Grover’s face was so fake that Jason had to cover his mouth in order to pretend he wasn’t laughing. It was a good thing that Grover was in charge of teenagers, because he absolutely sucked at talking to children.

This was where the whole silly rivalry between the Greek cabins and the Roman cabins started. Grover and the other councilors worked together to hype up the younger campers and tell them some story about why the flags were so important, and why the honor of their cabins depended on winning. It was pretty similar every year, so Jason didn’t feel too bad about not really being able to pay attention. Across the pavilion, he saw Thalia stand on a table, wicked grin on her face and purple bandanna tied around her head like Naruto wore his headband. She caught his eye and blew a loud, dramatic raspberry at him. All of the Roman kids turned to stare at whoever the Head Councilor was looking at, and some of the youngest ones wore shocked smiles that almost took up half their face.

This was Jason’s favorite part of the night. He elbowed Percy to get his attention and made a fist, shaking it at his sister like he was some sort of cartoon villain. Next to him, Percy stuck out his tongue and did a double thumbs-down. Some of the Greek campers started to notice of their antics, too.

There wasn’t any difference between the Greek side of camp and the Roman side, they were all just kids that went to an overnight two-month-long summer camp. If they stuck with it long enough, the Greek kids and the Roman kids would end up in the same place, anyway. But Jason could remember how funny it had been when he was seven to see all the Cool Big Kids and their dramatic rivalry, how the competition to see which cabin could get through an obstacle course faster or find all the objects on a scavenger hunt list first made everything that much more fun. He was fifteen now, and would be turning sixteen pretty soon, so the rivalry itself wasn’t what was important to him at this point.

No, what was important to him was the girl who couldn’t have been much older than eight who saw the two cool teenage boys absolutely hamming it up and tried to imitate them, but was giggling too hard to actually intimidate anyone. Percy cheered for her anyway and stood right behind her, jeering at the Juno campers who had joined Thalia.

Out of the corner of his eye, Jason caught Nico staring at him, a touch of confusion settling between his brows. Jason dropped the act for a second and smiled at him with a helpless shrug. Jason knew himself and the way that people saw him. He knew he was a pretty quiet kid, he knew he didn’t act as wild as his friends. He had been called boring before, though not usually to his face. He wasn’t exactly surprised that Nico didn’t expect him to start acting up in the middle of a strategy meeting, but that was okay. They had time to know each other better.

The other Zeus campers had joined him and Percy by now, and a good chunk of the younger campers, too. Percy slung his arm around Nico’s shoulders and tried to pull him into the group.

Jason only noticed the way Nico tensed because he had already been looking at him. His face went carefully blank, too, wiped free of any confusion that had been there before. Further proof. He had no idea what had happened, but he didn’t like the way Nico seemed less present. Percy pulled Nico forward, looking for all the world like he didn’t even notice the boy’s discomfort.

Actually, he probably didn’t. Percy was a great person and had a lot of strengths, but observation wasn’t one of them. Jason knew him and knew that he meant well, but that didn’t get rid of Nico’s reaction.

Jason stepped forward and into Percy’s space, trying to distract him from Nico. He bumped into Percy’s shoulder, looked him up and down with mock offense on his face, and shook his fist at him. Percy, predictably, took the bait. He dropped Nico’s shoulder and mirrored Jason for a second before pretending to notice the Romans again and pointing them out to Jason. Nico had slunk away almost immediately once Percy was no longer touching him.

Jason could only hope that he had actually helped, instead of messing up or offending him.

* * *

Capture the Flag at Mount Olympus had only two rules: No Fighting and Stay With Your Buddy. The entire camp had a pretty strict buddy system rule so that they didn’t accidentally lose any ten year olds, but during capture the flag, it was actually enforced. Anyone seen without their buddy by one of the councilors was immediately sent to the opposite team’s jail, or forced to do an arbitrary number of push-ups or jumping jacks, depending on who found them. Each camper was assigned a buddy from their own cabin, and the two of them as a unit were assigned a job. To make things a little more fair and fun for the younger campers, Zeus and Juno campers were usually on guard duty somewhere on the border, or put into jobs that weren’t quite as flashy. All of the older kids had an agreement that the younger campers were allowed to have all the fun on the first night, because there would be time for an older-kids-only match later.

Jason’s partner was one of the new kids, which was kind of nice. It gave him the chance to get to know Will one on one, without all of the louder members of the cabin barging in and distracting them. They were supposed to guard the “jail”, which was a big triangle in the middle of the woods with three bright orange cones as the points.

It was a big, empty triangle until about five minutes in. Frank came up to them with a few sheepish looking girls with purple bandannas tied around their heads like a bow. He was walking a few steps behind them, and he was alone. Will grinned at the Roman campers as they shuffled into jail, but Jason only raised an eyebrow at Frank.

“Where’s your buddy, buddy?”

Frank’s face twisted. “I don’t know. I was actually on my way to find someone to help me look for him when I tagged these two.”

The woods weren’t that dangerous or obviously the kids wouldn’t be allowed in them, but it was still better to not wander off alone. He glanced over at Will, who was watching the two of them with interest.

“You think you’re good for guard duty alone?” Jason knew these woods pretty well, and it would be almost impossible to lose someone if they were next to those cones. Will looked pretty pleased about being trusted to guard alone.

“No problem! You guys go find Nico.”

  
He and Frank decide that they would be able to cover more ground if they split up, even if it meant more risk for getting caught. They would meet back at the jail in ten minutes, and if they hadn’t found Nico by then, they would consider asking a councilor. Jason decided it was more exciting that way, anyway. He’d already had to dive behind a bush to hide from Travis, the Mercury councilor. It felt like a secret rescue mission, but for a sophomore in high school who would probably roll his eyes if he could see Jason now, peeping out from behind the bush to make sure Travis was really gone.

There was a rustling from behind him and Jason turned to see the flash of neon purple through the trees, followed by a giggle. He might have been breaking the rules and out of his post, but he was still playing the game, and those Roman kids were on the Greek side of the woods. Maybe he could tag them quickly, then get back to looking for Nico.

He tried to be quiet as he followed the Roman camper, but it was becoming clear that he didn’t need to. The camper looked like he was on the older end, maybe just one year under the Zeus cabin, and he met up with a few other kids and started laughing. There was something about his tone that Jason didn’t like, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it until he peeked out from behind a tree to finally catch a glimpse of what the Roman campers were doing.

He was right about a few things; these campers were certainly just one year off of joining the Zeus cabin, he recognized some of them. They were also absolutely in the wrong place, and not paying attention to the game at all. Jason had also been right to feel uneasy about them.

He had found Nico. Unfortunately, the Cupid cabin found him first. Now, Jason didn’t know much of the situation—the Cupid campers were talking, but the roaring in Jason’s ears prevented him from actually hearing anything aside from their tone—but he was absolutely sure that this wasn’t some friendly discussion. There were five Roman campers in total, all facing Nico with sharp grins. Nico himself was backed up against a tree, and his face was twisted in a snarl. Jason had never seen someone look so angry, but the Cupid kids didn’t appear to care at all.

This… This type of thing shouldn’t have happened at Mount Olympus. It shouldn’t have happened _anywhere_ , but this place was supposed to be a safe haven. It was supposed to be the place you could go to _escape_ the bad things about real life. What the _fuck_ were these kids doing, taking this thing that was supposed to be good and twisting it around?

Jason stepped out from behind the tree as conspicuously as he could. He spent most of his time trying to take up less space than he did. Not tonight. He might have been a quiet kid, but he knew exactly what he _could_ look like to those who didn’t know him—six feet and three inches of unfiltered blond jock—and he prayed that standing up to his full height and channeling his sister’s usual facial expressions would be enough.

“You five look _way_ too comfortable in enemy territory.” He took the time to look each of the campers in the eye, to remember their faces. From the way their eyes went round, his Don’t-Mess-With-Me eyes were working. “I’m gonna give you five seconds to run back to your own side before this game gets unfriendly.”

They ran. It didn’t even occur to Jason to be embarrassed about threatening kids younger than himself, not when Nico had looked like that. Nico, who had started to tremble from where he was propped up against the tree. From the look on his face (now directed at Jason), it wasn’t fear that made him shake, though. It was anger.

Jason tried to play calm. There was a lot of raw, untapped fury on that face. The other campers were honestly stupid if they decided to run from Jason, but weren’t afraid of Nico’s expression.

“Who were those guys?”

“How much did you hear?” Nico bit out instead of answering.

Fair. “Honestly, not much. I didn’t exactly wait around to hear words, I just saw your stance and their stance and panicked.” He also got very angry on Nico’s behalf, but somehow he thought that that might not go over well right now.

“Seriously?” Nico pushed himself off of the tree, still looking pale and a little shaky, but no less sharp. His hands came together and he started twisting his ring, just like he had during ice breakers. Jason realized that it was shaped like a skull and fought the completely inappropriate urge to grin.

“Absolutely, I wouldn’t lie about something like this. What was that about?”

Nico broke eye contact and stared off into the trees that the Cupid boys had disappeared into. He stopped twisting his ring and shoved his hands into his pockets.

“Nothing.”

Jason bit his lip. It clearly wasn’t nothing. “Those were the Cupid kids, right? What were they doing?”

“What did it look like?” Nico’s eyes snapped back to Jason, and the anger was back in the furrow of his brow and the curl of his lip.

“…How long have they been doing that?”

Jason felt like he was being pulled apart by Nico’s gaze. He wasn’t just looking at him, he was _inspecting_ him, flickering over every part of his face and posture. Jason remembered how easily Nico had read him earlier that day and wondered what he saw now.

Whatever it was, it made the angry set of his shoulders and the hard lines on his face relax after a minute. All the fight left his stance at once, and for the first time, Jason could see how tired he looked. How hadn’t he noticed the bags under his eyes before?

“Long enough. Let’s get back to the game, I need to find Frank.”

Nico started off into the woods, back to the heart of Greek territory. He sounded resigned. He had sounded resigned since the first time Jason had heard him speak. He had looked nervous at the beginning, before Jason had even known his name. This camp might have been a safe haven and a place of friendship for Jason, but he suddenly realized that it really, really wasn’t for Nico.

He decided that he wanted to change that.

“Hey, Nico.”

He paused and looked back at Jason, and his eyes reflected the setting sunlight that filtered through the leaves. They really did look like the night sky.

“If you ever want to talk about it, I’m here.”

Nico rolled his eyes and the serious atmosphere was broken. Jason almost would have felt bad about it if he didn’t see the tiniest upturn of Nico’s lips. He turned back to the woods and started walking, like he expected Jason to follow.

“Yeah, no. But thanks.”

That was okay. If he didn’t want to talk about it, he didn’t have to talk about it. All Jason had to do was let him know that he was there for him, and he would be there for him for the whole summer.

He followed.

**Author's Note:**

> let me know what you thought!!! i've been sitting on this idea for more than an year now, and i finally got around to writing it, so i hope you liked it. i'll try to have the next chapter done in two weeks, but i'm Super Inconsistent. comments help with my motivation, so if you want to see more of it, that's one way to help me keep writing!
> 
> thanks for reading :) i'm thaliagrayce on tumblr, too, so if you have any requests or just want to talk jasico with me, feel free to drop in


End file.
